Quadrupling Code Performance with a Useless If Statement

Quadrupling code performance with a "useless" if

While optimizing a compressor, I discovered that adding a seemingly useless conditional check could quadruple loop performance. By tricking the CPU's branch predictor, I broke the dependency chain that was slowing down execution. Although compilers usually remove such code, using a volatile cast forced the optimization, proving that sometimes misleading the machine yields the best results.

"Stupid compiler doesn't realize integers have hardware provenance."